Rising Sun Sets

Not pretty news out of Japan this morning

Japan’s core machinery orders were expected to post a modest -2.6% drop. Instead they had a worse collapse than anything seen in the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster, plunging by a stunning 14.8% . And the kick in the groin cherry on top was the current account surplus plunged by 62.6%: consensus forecast: -14.5%. The Japanese economy has once again ground to a halt, only this time it has no earthquake or nuclear explosion to blame. This time it is the entire world’s fault, where demand has collapsed proportionately. As a reminder the BOJ expanded its QE yet again on April 27. Must be time for another QE because this time will certainly be different after more than 30 years of failures.

categories Biz, Nanny State, Politics | | datetime July 9, 2012 6:38 am

2 Responses to “Rising Sun Sets”

  1. JeffS says:
    July 9, 2012 at 11:50 am

    Well, that sucks. To put it mildly.

  2. Syd B. says:
    July 9, 2012 at 12:12 pm

    I have a cousin in the metal fabricating business. He was in Japan last month to search out a very speficic piece of equipment. He said, as he travelled from on manufacturer to the other, they came up just short of begging him to buy their version of the equipment. He said they were willing to sell at cost so as to keep the doors open and their skilled employees working. Its only a matter of time before global demand impacts other manufacturing counties like Germany, U.S., Canada, etc….

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